The US this week again vetoed an Arab-backed resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire. But lurking in the background is Washington’s reported draft cease-fire resolution, linked to a hostage deal, and aimed at preventing an Israeli ground offensive on Rafah. If a temporary cease-fire is reached, that’s when US diplomacy and pressure may kick in to make it permanent, and the big picture policy questions about the "day after” the Gaza war, including a Palestinian state, come into play. But the hurdles to any push for a wider peace are enormous.
For one, the US has so far been unwilling to exert real leverage on Israel — in the form of withholding arms supplies or its veto in the UN Security Council — even as its frustration with Israeli policy grows. It’s a position exemplified by US President Joe Biden describing Israel’s conduct in Gaza as being “over the top” while continuing to transfer US weapons to Israel.
There are questions, too, about how serious the US ultimately is about trying to reshape the region with a Palestinian state at its heart. If months of bombing and an ever-rising Palestinian death toll did not prompt the US to begin to seek to force Israel’s hand until a catastrophic Rafah offensive loomed, is Washington really prepared to push harder still for a Palestinian state that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to prevent?
Reshaping the Region?
Before Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks, the US focus was on an Israel-Saudi normalization deal alongside deeper US-Saudi security ties, partly with a view to forming a regional anti-Iran axis. The Palestinian issue was left at the margins. Questions going forward are: 1) whether that approach is still possible, including possibly by default, given complications around a Palestinian state; or 2) whether the Oct. 7 attacks and their aftermath really are a regional game-changer — in which case stalling on a Palestinian state means endless regional instability that also threatens Israel-Arab normalization.
“The [Biden] administration is not naïve,” argued Eldad Shavit, a former senior Israeli intelligence officer. “It does not believe that it will be possible in the near future to significantly advance the two-state vision. But it does want the ability to allow the promotion of relations with Saudi Arabia.” It’s an outlook that is perhaps impossible to call, given the variables at stake, which include Arab consensus that regional aid to rebuild Gaza hinges on progress toward a Palestinian state.
But what's clear now is that a two-state solution has little real traction on the ground, not the least due to expansive Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Two-thirds of Israelis don’t support a Palestinian state, according to a December Gallup poll, compared to roughly two-thirds who supported it a decade ago. Over the weekend, Israel’s war cabinet passed a resolution rejecting the “unilateral recognition” of Palestinian statehood after the UK and France indicated they were mulling early recognition of a Palestinian state as part of a broader regional peace plan, and amid reports the US was also discussing doing so. A number of Israeli officials have repeatedly called for the displacement of Palestinians from Gaza. On the other side of the equation, a reformed Palestinian Authority could take years to be realized. Hamas, meanwhile, is unlikely to be eliminated as a political force.
Uncertain US Cease-Fire Move
More immediately, there is the thorny matter of securing a cease-fire. The US-backed draft resolution would mark the first time the US officially calls for a “cease-fire,” albeit "as soon as practicable." The resolution also opposes an Israeli military operation on Rafah “under current circumstances.” White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Tuesday that the US would not support an Israeli ground operation in Rafah unless there was a “credible way” that ensures the safety and security of civilians in Rafah — which he said the US had yet to be made aware of. The US and Egypt are concerned an Israeli assault on Rafah could push Palestinians across the border, which Egypt has warned could prompt it to suspend its decades-old peace deal with Israel.
Elan Etzion, a former Israeli deputy national security adviser now at the Middle East Institute, described the US position as “a diplomatic formulation for essentially a veto” of the Rafah offensive. The US, he explained, is creating a “ticking clock” by vetoing the latest UN Security Council resolution while planning to table its own draft resolution that could impose a halt in fighting on its ally, Israel. In doing so, the US is “playing the role that everyone expects it to play, which is global hegemon that puts an end to this fight or at least draws a line in the sand that forces everyone to comply,” Etzion said.
Yet, there is no guarantee that Israel will abide. In Israel, “the debate is more about when and how to do it in Rafah rather than if,” Chuck Freilich, also a former Israeli deputy national security adviser, told Energy Intelligence.
Longer Term: US-Israel Shift?
For Israel, another clock may also be ticking. Under Biden, there is no immediate danger of a real break between Israel and the US, Freilich said, but danger is brewing: "There is growing sentiment on the Democratic left to condition aid to Israel on changing its Palestinian policies … if it was a totally fringe position five years ago, it's no longer fringe.” He added: “I think in five years, we could have the people who are saying condition aid today, saying stop aid. And from Israel’s point of view, even a small diminution in American support has critical impact.”
Add to that growing European unease about Israel’s conduct of the war, alongside louder voices calling out Israel from the Global South. “The political horizon for Israel is very dark, and Israel doesn’t realize it, or at least ignores it,” Etzion said.